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Your classification of the Iwo Jima photo as being "staged" in the same manner as the Reichstag photo is incorrect and goes counter to the official records.
I am totally correct. Their first flag was smaller and on a length of pipe. They decided to put a larger flag up there, so the photographers were there waiting for the erection of the flag. Very much staged. The photos looks like a groups of men in the height of battle hurriedly running up the flag. That was not the case. Sorry to rain on your parade, but it was staged.
The Soviet flag was staged and based on the Iwo Jima photo. Only the watch was "airbrushed" out. The rest was a real photo. If it was doctored the soldier with the two watches would not have been in any photo.
Both are impressive. But the Soviet photo shows Berlin below, which was the intention.
The flag was the flag of the USSR. You appear confused.
I believe his use of the words "banner party" was not in reference to the flag, but to the group specifically tasked to raise the flag. The factualness of the story he relayed is not known. Some claim a flag was raised during or immediately following the combat, some that the staged photo was the first flag put up.
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Originally Posted by John-UK
I am totally correct.
No, you are wrong. I am totally correct.
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Their first flag was smaller and on a length of pipe. They decided to put a larger flag up there, so the photographers were there waiting for the erection of the flag. Very much staged. The photos looks like a groups of men in the height of battle hurriedly running up the flag. That was not the case. Sorry to rain on your parade, but it was staged.
I relayed the entire story, you obviously failed to read it. At no point was there an order given for a photographer to take a group of people up the mountain and try to take the perfect picture of men planting a flag. What was happening with the flags had nothing to do with "making a good picture" as I extensively detailed. If you read anything on the happenings surrounding the flag, you will realize that it was not staged. I never claimed that they were "men in the height of battle running up a flag." What Rosenthal captured were real actions. He did not "direct" nor "stage" the photo in anyway.
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The Soviet flag was staged and based on the Iwo Jima photo. Only the watch was "airbrushed" out. The rest was a real photo. If it was doctored the soldier with the two watches would not have been in any photo.
The Soviet picture was staged because they handed a flag to a photographer and told him to go take a picture. The photographer then looked at different sites, settled on the Reichstag, setup scenes and snapped a roll of film. The editing went beyond just the wristwatch and included adding more dramatic smoke and a more billowing Soviet flag. In fact, I just realized that the two previous photos in the thread included the added flag. Here is the original flag:
So, the above is cropped of the original photo. The published photo has a different flag, removed watch and more dramatic smoke in the background. The photo itself was entirely staged and directed by the photographer. Exactly what part of it is "real" or capturing a "real event"?
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Both are impressive. But the Soviet photo shows Berlin below, which was the intention.
Both are moving images. Rosenthal's photo is more impressive because it is REAL.
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Are they Dodge trucks below?
Hard to tell. They could very well be Dodge WC 3/4 ton 4x4's; the Soviets certainly had enough of them.
The flag was the flag of the USSR. You appear confused.
WTF? Is that attitude really necessary to this thread? Tell Antony Beevor. I am sure he would love to hear from an "internet expert" that he was confused.
And yes Captain Obvious, the flag was the flag of the USSR. Thanks for that insightful contribution to this topic and the time you took to tell us all this.
Does it really matter if it was staged? I mean the Soviets took Berlin. Does it really matter if they photographed a soldier on the very day or a month later? It still means something.
The flag raising on Iwo Jima was staged, the photographers were waiting from it to be raised. It was the second flag. This is funny.
Where's your substantiation for the claim that it was staged? Was that the Turkish ambassador, by any chance?
You're wrong. NJGoat is right...
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Upon landing, Rosenthal hurried toward Suribachi, lugging along his bulky Speed Graphic camera, the standard for press photographers at the time. Along the way, he came across two Marine photographers, Pfc. Bob Campbell, shooting still pictures, and Staff Sgt. Bill Genaust, shooting movies. The three men proceeded up the mountain together.
About halfway up, they met four Marines coming down. Among them was Sgt. Lou Lowery, a photographer for Leatherneck magazine, who said the flag had already been raised on the summit. He added that it was worth the climb anyway for the view. Rosenthal and the others decided to continue.
The first flag, he would later learn, was raised at 10:37 a.m. Shortly thereafter, Marine commanders decided, for reasons still clouded in controversy, to replace it with a larger flag.
At the top, Rosenthal tried to find the Marines who had raised the first flag, figuring he could get a group picture of them beside it. When no one seemed willing or able to tell him where they were, he turned his attention to a group of Marines preparing the second flag to be raised.
Here, with the rest of the story, is Rosenthal writing in Collier’s magazine in 1955:
“I thought of trying to get a shot of the two flags, one coming down and the other going up, but although this turned out to be a picture Bob Campbell got, I couldn’t line it up. Then I decided to get just the one flag going up, and I backed off about 35 feet.
“Here the ground sloped down toward the center of the volcanic crater, and I found that the ground line was in my way. I put my Speed Graphic down and quickly piled up some stones and a *** sandbag to raise me about two feet (I am only 5 feet 5 inches tall) and I picked up the camera and climbed up on the pile. I decided on a lens setting between f-8 and f-11, and set the speed at 1-400th of a second.
“At this point, 1st Lt. Harold G. Shrier … stepped between me and the men getting ready to raise the flag. When he moved away, Genaust came across in front of me with his movie camera and then took a position about three feet to my right. ‘I’m not in your way, Joe?’ he called.
“‘No,’ I shouted, ‘and there it goes.’
“Out of the corner of my eye, as I had turned toward Genaust, I had seen the men start the flag up. I swung my camera, and shot the scene.”
May be since the Soviet picture was staged, it's a stronger image of victory; it's more impressive and down to a point.
Looking at American picture in the past, I couldn't figure out what it was all about, other that it were some soldiers somewhere, ( may be establishing the new border, may be settling in some new territories- I don't know. That some major battle is over - that you can only figure out, if you know the name of the place and what happened there.)
But in Soviet picture you see the smoldering, destroyed city in the background and a soldier with a flag on top of the building. Even if you don't know the name of the city, even if you don't know what building it is, the message is clear. So the photograph ( whoever he was) definitely had a very artistic vision.
( Actually, I love those statues that were cut out later, apparently. They add to the drama, the eery feeling of history.)
Iwo Jima to me is some guys hastily erecting a flag because they have just won that territory. The picture tells most of the story.
The Soviet one clearly tells more story.
And of course there's another story....the flag-raisers themselves. Did they also go out and stump for 'bonds' under Uncle Joe??...;-)...I'm sure the relatives have their pix hanging in their living rooms.
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It was the second flag. This is funny. 
